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MONETARY HISTORY CALENDAR May 18 – 24

1846 – STATE OF IOWA CONSTITUTION ADOPTED
Article VIII of the original constitution states:
“Municipal corporations. Section 4. No political or municipal corporation shall become a stockholder in any banking corporation, directly or indirectly.
Banking associations. Section 5. No Act of the General Assembly, authorizing or creating corporations or associations with banking powers, nor amendments thereto shall take effect, or in any manner be in force, until the same shall have been submitted separately, to the people, at a general or special election, as provided by law, to be held not less than three months after the passage of the Act, and shall have been approved by a majority of all the electors voting for and against it at such election.”

1920 – SECRET MEETING BY BANKERS TO REDUCE THE MONEY SUPPLY, WHICH RESULTED IN 5 MILLION UNEMPLOYED
Testimony in 1938 before the House Committee on Banking and Currency by Senator Robert Owen, a co-sponsor of the Federal Reserve Act:
“I wrote into the bill which was introduced by me in the Senate on June 26, 1913, a provision that the powers of the System should be employed to promote a stable price level, which meant a dollar of stable purchasing, debt-paying power. It was stricken out. The powerful money interests got control of the Federal Reserve Board through Mr. Paul Warburg, Mr. Albert Strauss, and Mr. Adolph C. Miller and they were able to have that secret meeting of May 18, 1920, and bring about a contraction of credit so violent it threw five million people out of employment.
In 1920 that Reserve Board deliberately caused the Panic of 1921. The same people, unrestrained in the stock market, expanding credit to a great excess between 1926 and 1929, raised the price of stocks to a fantastic point where they could not possibly earn dividends, and when the people realized this, they tried to get out, resulting in the Crash of October 24, 1929.”

MAY 19

1977 – QUOTE BY BIRTH OF EARL OF CAITHNESS (MALCOLM IAN SINCLAIR), MEMBER OF THE UK HOUSE OF LORDS
“The next government must grasp the nettle, accept their responsibility for controlling the money supply and change from our debt-based monetary system. My Lords, will they? If they do not, our monetary system will break us and the sorry legacy we are already leaving our children will be a disaster.”

MAY 20

1851- BIRTH OF CHARLES MACUNE, HEAD OF SOUTHERN FARMERS’ ALLIANCE AND ORIGINATOR OF THE POPULIST “SUB-TREASURY PLAN”
The “Sub-Treasury Plan,” developed by the southern Populist Macune, was an ingenious proposal to circumvent banking corporations, merchants and landlords by farmers to avoid debt at high interest, which often resulted in the loss of their farms. The proposal called for farmers to store their harvest in federal warehouses when prices for their commodities were low. Farmers would leverage those commodities for loans (up to 80% of the market value in federal notes) to support themselves until prices rose. The proposal was especially useful to southern farmers with non-perishable crops (i.e. cotton). The farmer had one year to sell the crop and then pay back the note and 1% interest.

MAY 21

1912 – SPEECH BY J. LAWRENCE LAUGHLIN, CHAIR OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE NATIONAL CITIZENS’ LEAGUE, ON MONETARY REFORM
Born in Deerfield, Ohio, Laughlin was the first chair of the economics department at the University of Chicago and chair of the Executive Committee of the National Citizens League for the Promotion of a Sound Banking System from 1911-13. The League was established and funded with $5 million in contributions from the big New York banks (including those owned by John D. Rockefeller and J.P Morgan) to establish an “educational fund.” The fund financed respected university professors, such as Laughlin, to endorse the concept of creating a private central bank, what became the Federal Reserve Bank, created by the 1913 Federal Reserve Act. The “Citizens'” League provided a terrific cover in providing the appearance that privatizing/corporatizing money creation by a private national central bank was sound and reasonable since “objective” intelligent university professors promoted it.

MAY 22

1912 – SPEECH BY ROBERT MCCABE, VICE CHAIR OF THE OHIO CHAPTER OF THE NATIONAL CITIZENS’ LEAGUE, ON MONETARY REFORM
McCabe, an Ohio attorney, was recruited to speak on behalf of the plan supported by the nation’s biggest banks to create a private national central bank. He spoke throughout Ohio and the Midwest. He spoke on his date in Illinois. Among the points in his remarks was that the creation of what would become the Federal Reserve System, which would “avoid the tendency to take the money power of the nation out of the hands of the many and put it in the hands of the few.” The reality was and remains just the opposite.
The New York Times on the National Citizens’ League: ““A million dollars doesn’t go very far in a campaign of education such as is being carried on by the National Citizens League for the promotion of a sound banking system, yet the contribution of $1,000,000 for that purpose by individual Directors of the National banks of the country a short time ago provoked much comment and a suggestion that the electorate was the be corrupted by the use of these funds.”

MAY 23

1933 – ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT PRESENTED IN THE US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AGAINST THE FEDERAL RESERVE BOARD OF GOVERNORS, THE OFFICERS AND DIRECTORS OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE BANKS, THE US SECRETARY OF TREASURY AND OTHERS FOR THEIR COLLUSION IN CAUSING THE GREAT DEPRESSION.
US Congressman Louis McFadden, Chairman of the House Banking and Currency Committee, introduced the Articles of Impeachment. McFadden stated,
“The Great Depression was not accidental; it was a carefully contrived occurrence… bankers sought to bring about a condition of despair here, so that they might emerge as rulers of us all.”
“We have in this country one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. Some people think the Federal Reserve Banks are U.S. government institutions. They are private credit monopolies; domestic swindlers, rich and predatory money lenders, which prey upon the people of the United States for the benefit of themselves and their foreign customers….The truth is, the Federal Reserve Board has usurped the Government of the United States by the arrogant credit monopoly, which operates the Federal Reserve Board.”

1937 – DEATH OF JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER, OIL AND FINANCIAL CAPITALIST
“God gave me my money!”

MAY 24

1543 – DEATH OF NICOLAS COPERNICUS, MATHEMATICIAN AND ASTRONOMER
“Although there are countless maladies that are forever causing the decline of kingdoms, princedoms, and republics, the following four (in my judgment) are the most serious: civil discord, a high death rate, sterility of the soil, and the debasement of coinage.
The first three are so obvious that everybody recognizes the damage they cause; but the fourth one, which has to do with money, is noticed by only a few very thoughtful people, since it does not operate all at once and at a single blow, but gradually overthrows governments, and in a hidden, insidious way.”
Debasement means lowering the value of. What lowers the value of our currency? How about creating it out thin air like the Federal Reserve via Quantitative Easing (QE) has done to prop up major banks?

1604 – ENGLISH COURT DECISION ON “MIXED MONEY” CASE
English court rules that sovereign governments possess the power to create, regulate, limit and define money.
“The Mixt Moneys case decided that Money was a Public Measure, a measure of value, and that, like other measures, it was necessary in the public welfare that its dimension of volume should be limited, defined and regulated by the State. The whole body of learning left us by the ancient and renascent world was invoked in this celebrated dictum: Aristotle, Paulus, Godin and Budelius were summoned to its support; the Roman law, the common law and the statutes all upheld it; “the State alone had the right to issue money and to decide of what substances its symbols should be made, whether of gold, silver, brass or paper. Whatever the State declared to be money, was money.” – from The History of Money in America by Alexander Del Mar

1924 – DEATH OF CHARLES LINDBERGH, REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN (MN) AND FATHER OF FAMED AVIATOR
“This [Federal Reserve] Act establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the president signs this bill, the invisible government by the monetary power will be legalized. The people may not know it immediately but the day of reckoning is only a few years removed, the worst legislative crime of the ages perpetrated by this bank bill.”
“The financial system has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board. That Board administers the finance system by authority of a purely profiteering group. The system is private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people’s money.”

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Why this calendar? Many people have questions about the root causes of our economic problems. Some questions involve money, banks and debt. How is money created? Why do banks control its quantity? How has the money system been used to liberate (not often) and oppress (most often) us? And how can the money system be “democratized” to rebuild our economy and society, create jobs and reduce debt? Our goal is to inform, intrigue and inspire through bite size weekly postings listing important events and quotes from prominent individuals (both past and present) on money, banking and how the money system can help people and the planet. We hope the sharing of bits of buried history will illuminate monetary and banking issues and empower you with others to create real economic and political justice. This calendar is a project of the Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee. Adele Looney, Phyllis Titus, Donna Schall, Leah Davis, Alice Francini, Deb Jose and Greg Coleridge helped in its development. Please forward this to others and encourage them to subscribe. To subscribe/unsubscribe or to comment on any entry, email monetarycalendar@yahoo.com